This book shows how Shakespeare's excellence as storyteller, wit and
poet reflects the creative process of conceptual blending. Cognitive
theory provides a wealth of new ideas that illuminate Shakespeare, even
as he illuminates them, and the theory of blending, or conceptual
integration, strikingly corroborates and amplifies both classic and
current insights of literary criticism. This study explores how
Shakespeare crafted his plots by fusing diverse story elements and
compressing incidents to strengthen dramatic illusion; considers
Shakespeare's wit as involving sudden incongruities and a reckoning
among differing points of view; interrogates how blending generates the
"strange meaning" that distinguishes poetic expression; and situates the
project in relation to other cognitive literary criticism. This book is
of particular significance to scholars and students of Shakespeare and
cognitive theory, as well as readers curious about how the mind works.